Our plain old hard drive is getting increasingly replaced by SSD, now Seagate is soon going to announce Hybrid drives (Momentus XT) which take advantage of both these technologies to give you the best of both world. Here is a summary.
Hard Drives (spinning Disk drives)
Advantages:
- Lowest cost per GB
- Easy availability
- Fairly reliable
Disadvantages:
- Not drop proof
- Generates Heat
- Slower than SSD
- Consumes more power than SSD
Solid State Drive (SSD)
Advantages:
- Fastest speeds today
- Drop proof, as there is no moving parts, hence rugged enough to be used in extreme environements
- Low power consumption, so increases your battery life
- Light weight so reduces weight of your portable device
Disadvantages:
- Most Expensive
Hybrid drives:
Advantages:
- Uses both SSD and spinning disk drive
- Gives cost advantages of spinning disk drive
- Provides performance of SSD
- Dynamically moves more often accessed file from spinning section to SSD
Disadvantages:
- Still not drop proof like the SSD
- Power consumption will be higher than SSD
Read full review and speed tests.
Seagate Momentus XT 320 GB 2.5 Inch Solid State Hybrid Drive for Laptops available for $125